There's one type of movie review comment that drives me right up the fucking wall. Here are three examples, from my Twilight review:

Twilight was a very good movie, not much like the book but it was still very good. You seem to lack much of an imagination or take yourself so seriously that you cant let go and just enjoy something. I find that sad and think you need to loosen up a little and just enjoy things. Critics don't only need to love movies like citizen cane and it doesnt make you any less of a man or woman to admit you like something childish. Get past your pride.
Posted by At least Twilight was better than harry Potter Fat Ass on November 25, 2008 at 12:34 AM

I loved it. It's a guilty pleasure for a lot of people, get over yourselves people!
Posted by ok... on November 24, 2008 at 10:59 AM

Yeah...who made the rule that all ENTERTAINMENT has to be high-minded and thought-provoking? I enjoy reading a tense pre-teen makeout scene and then jumping my boyfriend. It brings back the ecstatic stupidity of my teen years, and what's more, reading those books kept me sane during the last 2 weeks of the election. Noam Chomsky has no such super-power. I plan on seeing and movie AND LIKING IT just to spite this vitriolic reviewer. (so there)*eye roll*
Posted by MLEemily on November 23, 2008 at 12:21 PM

And just to show that it's not all about me, in Film Intern Evan Stewart's excellent review of Wanted on DVD, this comment came up:

Isn't it alright for Hollywood to come out with some escapist cheesy action flick for people to laugh at and watch and enjoy every now and then?
I mean...you don't watch Wanted expecting to see oscar gold...you watch it for the action and the chance to laugh at it. Perhaps you've forgotten about all the other cheesy sci-fi esque action flicks that we still love to laugh at today.
Posted by Hunter on November 24, 2008 at 1:52 PM

Listen to me, people. It is true that I have been known to occasionally read Noam Chomsky and I have seen Citizen Kane twice, although I wouldn't put it in my top ten films of all time or anything. But two of my all-time favorite movies are The Rundown and Con Air. I also loved Bring it On, and I watched and adored just about all of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. And here's the important part:

I am so sick of people apologizing for crap product by calling it "mindless entertainment." I love mindless entertainment. But I love good mindless entertainment. Twilight and Wanted are both bad pieces of mindless entertainment.

If you can't tell the difference between a movie that is money-grubbing shit and a movie that somebody, from the screenwriter on out to the actors, actually cared about, you are either A) a child or B) lowering your expectations to some pretty goddamned dismal levels. It's possible to overthink dumb entertainment—hell, Camille Paglia made a living out of it in the nineties—and it's possible to accidentally make something dumb and great (Showgirls.) But it's pretty easy to tell when something actually, really sucks.

And if you're going to try to excuse these films as "mindless entertainment," you are, as the first comment up there says, "Get(ting) past your pride." You're not giving your mind a break, you're reveling in your own stupidity. We are all better than this; we don't have to swallow this awful shit and smile and say "More, please." We can hold out for something just a little bit better, and appreciate that better thing when it comes along.

That is all.